AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 



LORD BALTIMORE'S STRUGGLE AVITH 
THE JESUITS, 1634-1649. 



Prof. ALFRED PEARCE DENNIS, Ph. D. 

SMITH COLLKGE. 



(Fro.u the Annual Report of the American Historical ABSOciation f..r 1900, 
Vol. I, pages 105-125.) 



WASHINGTON: 

GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE. 
19 01. 



FEB 3 1903 
D.ofD, 



AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 



LORD BALTIMORE'S STRUGGLE WITH 
THE JESUITS, 1634-1649. 



Prof. ALFRED PEARCE DENNIS. Ph. D.. 

a 

SMITH COLLEGE. 



(From the Aiiiiiiiil lieport of tlie Aiiiuiiiaii llis;..n(;il A.ssociatiiui (or l!l(i(), 
VoL r, pages 105-125.) 



WASHINGTON: 

GOVEKNMENT PKI.\TIN(i OFFICE. 
1 i> ( » i . 



1 
Vl— LORD lULTDIORE'S STRUGGLE WITH THE JESUITS, 1G34-1649. 



By Prof. ALFRED PEARCE DENNIS, Ph.D. 
SMITH (OLLEGK. 



105 



LORD BALTIMORE'S STRUGGLE WITH THE JESUITS, 1634-1649. 



By Prof. Alfred Pe.vroe Dennis, Ph. D., Smith College. 



The early colonizers of Maryland, though sprung' from a 
common stock, were not a homogeneous people in their sym- 
pathies and antipathies. Maryland soil, as early as the mid- 
dle of the seyenteenth century, had been occupied by three 
distinct classes of settlers. Clayborne was first in the held 
with his Protestant settlement on Kent Island, in Chesapeake 
Ba3^ Profit, and not piety, was the guiding influence with 
Clayborne; preemption, and not redemption, gaye pith and 
purpose to his enterprise. Between these Church of England 
men, backed in their possession by fairly good legal claims, 
and the later Koman Catholic settlers at St. Mary's there was 
no more sympathy or community of interest than is indicated 
in the armed conflict that actually ensued between them. 
Aside from the sporadic attempts of Clayborne to yindicate 
his property rights by arms, he and his bandhaye no impor- 
tant formatiye influence in the earl}' life of the Maryland 
colony. 

Nor was there more community of interest between the 
Catholic planters on the Potomac and the Puritan band that 
settled some fifteen years later on the banks of the Seyern. 
Fiye 3'ears had not run their course before Old World ani- 
mosities had burst into a flame and inyolyed Papist and Pre- 
cisian in the stern struggle of an appeal to arms. Distrust, 
prejudice, antipathy, doubly sealed the commission of eyery 
actor in this struggle; yet each party represented principles 
complemental and significant in the splendid deyelopment of 
ciyil and religious liberty in the Maryland Proyincc. Speak- 
ing broadly, it may be said that in the early life of the colony 
the Roman Catholic was tolerant in religion but narrow in 
politics, while the Puritan was narrow in religion but in poli- 

107 



108 AMERIOATSr HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

tics liberal. Historians in retouching the glowing picture of 
the religious toleration of the Koman Catholic colonists have 
not unf requently scouted the Puritan settlers as troublers of a 
well-ordered system, as Adullamites, drawing into sj^nipathy 
Avith themselves the disaffected,, the chagrined, the Ishmael 
])rood that takes to the wilderness in explosive self-assertion 
rather than endure identification with a regime which is con- 
sidered l)ad principally l)ecause it is not of their own making. 
It is true that the example of these Puritans in religious mat- 
ters was one of exclusiveness, narrowness, and ban, and chiefly 
))ecause this is true the fact should not l>e ignored that their 
influence in the early life of the province was liberalizing and 
wholesome on the political side. 

It is the usually accepted view that Maryland was intended 
by the Calverts as an asylum for Roman C^atholics, who were 
^to find upon the banks of the Potomac the Plymouth of the 
J'uritau refugees. Preliminar}^ to an investigation of the 
second Lord Baltimore's struggle with a body of his corelig- 
ionists, it is worth our while to briefly reexamine the question 
of the purpose of the Calverts in founding the Maryland 
colon3\ In the opinion of the writer the purpose of the Cal- 
verts in founding the colony was chiefly economic and not 
religious. Viewed in this light, the subsequent struggle of the 
bird proprietor of the province with the Jesuits ])ecomes more 
intelligible. 

An}' theory that ma}^ be accepted in explanation of purpose 
in the colonization of Maryland leads I)}' natural regress of 
causes to the status of nonconformists in England at the be- 
ginning of the period of American colonization. 

Up to the acjcession of the first of the Stuarts the struggle 
between the Crown and the Puritans scarcely widened beyond 
the field of wordy ecclesiastical controversy. The strife of 
the last of the Tudors, however, v^ith the Catholics repre- 
sented a grave political exigency, in which the perpetuitv of 
her Government no less than Protestant establishment was at 
stake. Elizal)eth looked upon Catholic intrigues as a chal 
lenge to royal authority and met them with a policy of coer- 
cion which increased in severity until the day of her death. 
Under James, the first of the Stuarts, the old policy of relig- 
ious coei'cion was continued, but with the important distinc- 
tion that Catholic and Puritan exchanged positions as objects 



LORD Baltimore's struggle with the Jesuits. 109 

of ro3"al hostilit}^ Precise]}' the causes which Ijroiight a re- 
hixation of the penal laws against Catholics induced increased 
severity to the Puritans. The Puritan's abhorrence of prel- 
ac}- was as strongly marked as was James's devotion to an 
Erastian church system. The struggle to preserve his auton- 
omy took form in a contest with the Presbyterian clergy of 
Scotland before James came to the English throne. Mel- 
ville, second only to Knox as a figure in Scottish ecclesiastical 
history, had assumed the leadership in a contest with the 
civil power which culminated sixty years later in open rebel- 
lion against Charles I. The democratic drift of Melville and 
his coreligionists had its_g]enesis_Jn_^^nevu^w5^ 



in Scotland, extended across the border, spanned the ocean, 
and is witnessed anew in the strife of settlers in the American 
wilderness for political equality. James, soured by Presby- 
terian affronts across the border, recorded his experience at a 
later day in his reply to Dr. Reynolds at the Hampton Court 
conference. "If you aim,"" declared he, "at a Scottish Pres- 
bytery, it agreeth as well with monarch}^ as God with the devil. 
Then Jack and Tom and Will and Dick shall meet and censure 
me and m}^ council."^ As the strength of the Puritan faction 
in England increased, the apparently irreconcilable parties of 
the opposition were drawn together for common defense. 
Long before Puritanism had gained absolute control in the 
days of the overthrow of Charles I the forces of the court, 
the established church, the Catholics, and the Arminians had 
practically joined hands against the common enemy. The 
hatred James bore the Puritans and his natural clemency to 
the Catholics were further emphasized as early as 1(516, when 
the King entered upon negotiations for the marriage of Prince 
Charles to the Spanish infanta. For seven 3'ears these nego- 
tiations dragged on through the tedious mazes of royal proto- 
cols and papal dispensations. It was precisely within these 
3'ears when the penal laws against the Catholics were virtu- 
all}' suspended, when scores of Catholic lords and knights 
were in the enjoyment of high public trusts, and the ro^'al 
purpose pointed to a wider indulgence than had been known 
for half a century, that George Calvert projected his scheme 
of western empire. As early as 1620 he obtained a grant of 

1 Fuller, Church History, HI, p. 210. 



110 AMEEICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

that portion of the i.sland of Newfoundland lying between the 
Ba}' of Bulls and Cape St. Maiys, The grant erected into a 
province was called Avalon. Sir William Alexander, to 
whom the iirst grant of Nova Scotia was made, writes at this 
period: 

Master Secretary Calvert liath planted a company at Ferriland, who 
l)oth for buildings and making trial of the ground hath done more than 
was ever performed by any in so short a time, having on hand a brood of 
horses, kowes, and other bestials, and by the industry of his people he is 
beginning to draw back yearly some benefits from thence.^ 

All the evidence goes to show that Calvert obtained his 
grant for purposes of exploitation. There is not a hint to 
confirm a theorj^ that he was seeking to provide an asylum 
for persecuted Catholics in the Western World. The Avalon 
venture proved a bad investment. When Calvert visited his 
Avalon plantation in 1627, he found that the glowing picture 
of its natural advantages had been overdrawn. He writes a 
pitiful letter to King Charles asking for a grant in Virginia, 
with such privileges as King James had been pleased to grant 
him. Without waiting for a reply, he sailed for a more 
genial clime, reaching Virginia in the autumn of 1629. The 
"privileges" he sought from Charles were finall}^ granted in 
a charter modeled upon the Avalon patent. In their salient 
features the two instruments are identical. Both were no 
doubt drafted by Calvert's own hand; both contain empt}^ 
stock phrases about the pious purposes of the grantee, and 
both contain ambiguous passages regardmg ecclesiastical 
organization that practically left the way open to toleration. 
If it can not be insisted with reason that the Avalon colony 
was planted as a retreat for Roman Catholics, no more can the 
common opinion be justified that the Mar3dand grant was 
obtained with like purpose, unless perhaps it can be shown 
that Calvert was a Protestant when he planned his Avalon 
colony and a Catholic when he sought his Maryland grant. 
And this is precisely the opinion that is entertained by a num- 
ber of eminent authorities. The}' are convinced that George 
Calvert, after forming the design of planting the Avalon col- 
ony, became a convert to Catholicism and that in consequence 
of religious scruples he, in 1621, retired from the state secre- 
taryship. 



' Horace Walpole, Authors of England, p. 313. 



LORD BALTIMORE S STRUGGLE WITH THE JESUITS. Ill 

It is reasonably certain that George Calvert was an ad- 
herent of the (/hurch of Rome before the Avalon charter of 
1623 was granted. The public acknowledgment of his fidelity 
to the mother church has been commonly accepted as a cause 
of his withdrawal from office. It was, however, simply a mask 
to cover his defeat by Buckingham. The divergent aims of 
the two in the Spanish match negotiations and the ultimate 
triumph of Buckingham in his programme of opposition fur- 
nish evidence that Calvert's political career received its death- 
blow upon the collapse of the proposed marriage alliance. 

Calvert was the only secretary employed in the Spanish 
negotiations. In the reaction which represented the utter 
defeat of his policy and the triumph of Buckingham, Calvert 
openly avowed his attachment to the Church of Rome and, 
urging religious scruples for his action, resigned his office in 
February, 1625.^ 

Though driven from power b}^ Buckingham, Calvert con- 
tinued to enjoy the favor of James and his son. He was 
created Baron of Baltimore and left free to pursue those 
plans, upon which his mind had been set for years, of empire 
beyond the sea. A decade of costly experiment closed with") 
the grant of Maryland, "a grant the most ample and sover- C, 
eign in its character that ever emanated from the English i 
Crown." -^ 

Material interest was the moving purpose of the first Lord 
Baltimore's successful attempt to establish a permanent set- 
tlement in the Western World. It was the design of Lord 
Baltimore to assure to himself and to his successors the dig- 
nity and authority of the counts-palatine of the Middle Ages. 
The Maryland charter express!}^ confers upon the proprietary 
that species of local absolutism exercised from mediaeval times 
by the bishops of Durham as counts-palatine." 

That the first Lord Baltimore was a man of lofty integrity 
is unquestioned. That he, as a zealous Catholic, was actuated 
chiefly by the desire of promoting the spiritual interests of 
his coreligionists in founding the Maryland colony is a claim 
which he, as an honest man, could not have made for himself 

lEggleston, The Beginnings of a Nation, p. 260. Vide, copy of original from British 
Museum additional MSS. 27962 C, containing Salvetti's contemporary account of the con- 
siderations which led Calvert to retire from the secretaryship; also Gardiner, England 
under Buckingham and Charles I, Vol. I, p. 156. 

- Egglestou, p. 236, note 12. 



112 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

in his own day, and a claim which should not bo made for him 
in our da}^ Cecilius Calvert, the second Lord Baltimore, 
'" heir to his father's plans as well as to his father\s plantation," 
letiects as though in a mirror the religious temper and the 
purposes of George Calvert. The second Lord Baltimore 
sent over his first colonists to Maryland in 1634. Of these 
adventurers who seated themselves at St. Mar3^s, near the 
lianks of the Potomac, a very considerable number, if not a 
majority, were Protestants. Father Henry More writes to 
Rome, ''by far the greater part of the colony were heretics." ^ 
The father provincial writes to Rome, less than seven years 
after the founding of the colon}", "three parts of the people 
or four at least are heretics.""^ The numerical strength of 
the Protestants in Lord Baltimore's original Mar^dand expe- 
dition goes to uphold the position that ^Nlar^dand was never 
intended and never became an as3dum for Catholic refugees. 
Hands and not hearts wore primarily considered in recruiting 
laljorers for the vinej'ard of the Calvorts in the western wilder- 
ness. The political balance of power vested in the Catholics 
through their intellectual and financial supremacv remained 
with them for fifteen j^ears after the landing of the original set- 
tlers. Cecilius Calvert had the foresight to perceive that the 
colony could not be successfull}" planted without Protestants, 
))ut he was wise enough to understand that Protestants would 
not embark upon the enterprise unless religious freedom should 
be guaranteed by the Catholic proprietary, and that Protestant 
England with a Parliament of puritan temper would not for 
an instant tolerate the erection of a distinctl}^ Roman Catholic 
government within the bounds of her territorial jurisdiction. 
Toleration of Protestants was all of a piece with the oppor- 
tunist polic}' of the proprietary. That George Calvert had 
actually arranged with the Jesuit fathers for planting, in 
Maryland, a colony where his coreligionists would enjo}' all 
the privileges of a Catholic countr}" is a matter of record. 
Certainly the Societv of Jesus expected this, and jurisdiction 
was not settled before 1638.^ 

' Records English Province S. J. v. 3, series 7, p. 364. 

2 Paper headed "coxes." Vol. IV, Stoneyhurst MSS. Copy held at Woodstock College, 
Wood.stock, Md. 

'•> Letter of Father Copley to Lord Baltimore, No. 2, Calvert Papers I, and other letters 
in same collection sent from Maryland to Lord Baltimore in 1GS3, protesting bitterly 
against the laws that subordinated the spiritual to the temporal authority. The tone of 
the letters indicates that spirituals had been led to expect greater privileges in the colony. 



LORD Baltimore's struc4gle with the jesuits. 113 

Less than live year.s after the planting- of the colony Balti- 
more was forced into a strug-gle with the Jesuits b}^ the dis- 
coveiy that the}" had already secretly acquired Indian lands 
within the territory defined by his patent. Their persistence 
in disputing his " authority and dominion" aroused him to 
coercive measures as early as 1638 and led him to embody an 
act for toleration in a code of sixteen laws sent over by him 
in 16-18 for passage. In the meantime toleration had been, 
for politic reasons, the unvaried habit of the community for 
fifteen years. The toleration act sent over with the sixteen 
laws is to be regarded as one factor of a triple scheme for 
curbing the power of tiie Jesuits. It was the intention of the 
proprietary to swamp Jesuit influence by opening wider the 
door to Protestant immigration. He went further, setting up 
a Protestant administration under William Stone, of Virginia, 
and finally the society's hopes of spiritual independence, 
founded upon material sufiiciency, were crushed b}^ forcing to 
a passage stringent laws which absolutel}^ forbade the acquisi- 
tion or ownership of Maryland lands by trusts, societies, or 
corporations without the express consent of the proprietary. 
The entire scheme, which was not accepted by the people until 
April, 1650, embraced as perfected the bod}^ of the sixteen 
laws, the restrictive conditions against the acquisition of land 
by the Jesuits, and such special favorable conditions to Prot- 
estant settlers as would assure their preponderance in the 
colony. Here we have some guiding principles that enter 
into the apparently enigmatical dealings of the second Lord 
Baltimore with his Catholic settlers in Maryland. Baltimore's 
course in the encouragement of Protestant propagandism and 
in the setting up of a Protestant government becomes at once 
consistent and explicable; the passage of coercive laws in part 
by Catholics against their spiritual brethren no longer baffles 
all attempts at rational analysis. 

The records show that the Society of Jesus directh^ and in- 
directly brought into the colony during the first five 3'ears of 
its existence some sixty persons. ^ The Jesuit fathers evidently 
expected more liberal treatment than they found. The earliest 
records extant in the Maryland archives date from 1637-38, 

1 Calvert Papers, I, pp. 164-5, 167-8, 203, 205. Assembly Proceedings, I, Maryland 
Archives, Calendar, p. xiii. Also Fr. Copley in Calvert Papers, I, p. 167. Father More's 
Twenty Cases. Md. Hist. Soc. Fund Pub., No. 18, pp. 73, 79. 

H. Doc. 548, pt 1 8 



114 AMERICATT HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

the records for the antecedent period of four j^ears are almost 
altogether missing, but the amazed protests and the depreca- 
tory tone of the Spirituals as recorded in the letters of 1638 
in the Calvert Papers go to show that the society expected, 
and were ready to contend for privileges which had been 
withdrawn from the mother church by constitutions and 
statutes dating from the settlement of Clarendon (1164) to the 
dissolution of the monasteries (1540.)^ 

The old drama of Beket and the Plantagenet Prince was 
reenacted on Maryland soil. The duel once more was pre- 
paring of the men of letters and of the keys against the men 
of laws and of the sword. As early as 1638 penalties were 
denounced against the acceptance of Indian lands for the use 
of any other than the lord proprietor, and the "Romish" 
clergy were also spiritually quarantined hj the erection of 
the fourteenth centur}^ barriers of praemunire. Not onl}^ 
was prtemvinire reenacted in the western world, but a score 
of years of colonization had not elapsed before the English 
statutes of mortmain dating from the age of Edward I to that 
of Henry VIII were incorporated as a part of the fundamental 
laws of the Maryland Province. Special stress was laid by 
the lord proprietor on the clauses against " uses " or secret 
trusts, the doctrine of uses being an "invention of ecclesias- 
tical ingenuity to creep out of the prohibition of mortmain.""^ 

The earliest code of the province which has been preserved, 
that of 1637-38, has to do principally with subordinating the 
spiritual to the temporal authority. While in England both 
sides were arming for a struggle in which autocracy and feudal- 
ism wore mortally stricken; while Europe was convulsed with 
the agonies of a contest that ended, a decade later, in the 
formal acknowledgment of two new republics, Baltimore, in 
the Western World, was busily engaged in estalilishing jtn 
absolutism based upon feudal privilege. He intended that 
his jurisdiction should reflect precisely' the position of absolute 
proprietorship set forth in his patent. He looked upon papal 
interference as a challenge to his vested rights and persisted 
in ignoring or defjdng all threats of ecclesiastical coercion to 

1 Letters from Father* White and Copley in Calvert Papers, I. 

Tor the laws defining further the relation of the spiritual to the temporal authority 
in the colony, vide. Maryland Archives, Assembly Troceednigs, I, pp. 248, 264. Council 
Proceedings, I, pp. 390, 227, 237. Calvert Papers, I, pp. 1G4, 192, 213, 219. Md. Hist. See. 
Fund Pub., Nos. 7 and 18, 



LORD Baltimore's struggle with the Jesuits. 115 

the day of his death.- It was the purpose of Baltimore to in- 
troduce a feudal system whose burdens, heavier than England 
had known since Mag-na Charta, included both knig'ht service 
and aids in money. It was through no lack of purpose on the 
part of the proprietary that outworn feudalism languished 
upon the soil of the new world. The plans of Baltimore con- 
templated the division of the province into baronies and man- 
ors. Under this system the lord of a manor must pledge the 
maintenance of twenty men to secure the property and pay 20 
shillings annually on ever}^ 1,000 acres of land acquired. It 
was not enough for the manorial lord to equip for battle and 
maintain in the field 15 freemen; he must also recognize the 
authority of the muster master and accept vinquestioningly 
all the fines, forfeitures, and punishments this functionary 
might impose.^ In 1638 the Jesuits held at least one manor. 
The superior of the mission and two other fathers were twice 
summoned to the provincial assembly that passed the anti- 
ecclesiastical laws, but twice declined to appear.^ In this they 
followed an English precedent set in 1295 — the clergy at that 
time perceiving that their presence in Parliament, only sought 
for the purpose of gaining their assent to taxation, placed 
many difficulties in the way of attendance, and finally with- 
drew to convocation. The clergy of Maryland, Avhile relieved 
from knight service under the feudal laws, appear to have 
borne some share of the burden of taxation despite the per- 
sonal appeal of the superior in 1638 to the proprietary for 
relief from both taxes and service.'' But this was not all. 
Causes matrimonial and testamentary were from the early 
months of 1638 under civil and not spiritual control, if ordy 
through Secretary Lewger's commission from Baltimore. 
This state of affairs did not obtain in contemporary England 
and was regarded as an unprecedented step. 

1 Father Copley's letter of 1638 to Lord Baltimore reviews the onerous features of the 
manorial system; expresses the opinion that few will tarry in the country if the institu- 
tion referred to be permently established.— Calvert Tapers, I. 

2 Father Copley writes to Lord Baltimore: "It was not fitt that we sliould be there 
(meaning the provincial assembly) in person and our Proxis would not lie admitted in 
that manner as v<e could send them and therefore wo were excluded thence; soo we did 
not intermeddle with them." He goes on to add, apparently smarting under the obnox- 
ious anti-ecclesiastical laws passed a few months before: "You may be confident tliat 
John Lewger's lack of confidence in us is of the nature of ' mere frivolous .suspitions of 
his ownc, without any true ground.' " "Truly," he adds, " the devill is very busy hero to 
raise such lyke apprehensions." — Calvert Papers, J, p. 158. 

3 Calvert Papers, I, pp. 157-166. 



116 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

Small wonder, then, that Father Copley predicts the ruin 
of the province, and with a show of reason complains of the 
arbitrary character of a government under which an indefinite 
exercise of authority without lawful commission from the lord 
proprietor is placed in the category of an "enormous crime. "^ 
•'Things have come to a dreadful pass,'' protests the pious 
father, "when even by Catholiques a law is provided to hange 
any Catholique bishop that should come hither, and also every 
priest, if the exercise of his functions be inteipreted jurisdic- 
tion or authority." To rationally explain the passage of laws 
obnoxious to Catholics by a legislature under Catholic control 
requires a brief examination of the ingenious use of the proxy 
b}^ the men who sat in the councils of early Maryland. B}- 
skillful manipulation of the proxy, political control, originall}' 
vested in the Catholics, remained in their hands several years 
after the Protestants had certainl}^ gained a numerical pre- 
ponderance in the colony. More than this, the most powerful 
proxy rights had been absorbed by the agents of the proprie- 
tary. Hence the frequent passage of legislative acts that 
were repugnant to a majority of the population. Catholic as well 
as Protestant. 

The proxy power was greatl}^ abused in the Maryland Prov- 
ince as early as 1637-38. In 1642 fourteen persons, through 
ingenious manipulation of proxies, cast the vote for all the 
freemen of the colony. Elaborate attempts have been made 
to prove that as the Protestants were in the majority in the 
first colonizing expedition, their preponderance continued 
after the planting of the colony, and that to this fact was due 
the passage of laws repugnant to the Catholic interest. Now, 
though it be a fact that the Protestants were numerically 
stronger than the Catholics in the original expedition, and 
though this predominance in numbers never at any time de- 
clined during the life of the colon}^ this fact does not prove 
for a moment that the anti-Catholic laws of 1637-38, of Octo- 
ber, 1610, and of September, 1612, owe their origin and pas- 
sage to Protestant majorities. Far from it. The political as 
well as social control of the colony was lodged with the Cath- 
olics for full}' fifteen 3^ears after the landing of the pioneer 
settlers. That the Protestants had sufficient political influ- 

'An offense denominated "enormous" was punishable by death under the laws of 
1637-38. 



LORD Baltimore's struggle with the Jesuits. 117 

ence to pass a single law before the middle of the century 
without the aid of Catholics is not susceptible of proof 
from an ingenuous use of the records. The Protestants who 
joined the first expedition were plain men of the field and 
forge. The}' belonged chiefly to the class of redemptioners 
and indentured servants. The artisans and skilled laborers 
received lands in three years, and were eligible to sit in the 
assembly of 1687-88. Unskilled laborers bound to service 
did not become freeholders in time to sit in this assembly, 
and there can ])e no doubt that its personnel was overwhelm- 
ingly Catholic. But even should we grant for a moment that 
a majority of Protestants ever sat in a provincial assembl}^ 
during the first decade of the colonj^'s history, Protestant con- 
trol would not be a necessary sequence of such an assumption. 
The shrewd manipulation of proxies, possessed by the Catho- 
lics, renders idle and inconclusive any comparison of political 
influence based upon mere numbers. Father More's state- 
ment is often quoted to show that political power and control 
had passed to the Protestants by 1640 or 1641. Father More 
writes that at this time Secretary Lewger called an assembly 
composed almost entirely of heretics. This assembly, how- 
ever, of 1640-41, "composed with a few exceptions of here- 
tics,'' was not a general assembly of the freemen, but a body 
made up of elected burgesses and of councillors summoned by 
special writ. Of the active members in the assembly, Brent, 
(ireene, Lewger, Lusthead, Pulton, and Fen wick were Cath- 
olics and men of influence.^ 

Laws obnoxious to the Jesuits were passed in 1637-38 b}^ 
Catholics through means of the proxy, thirteen men controlling 
the entire vote of the province. In the assembly of 1640 the 
laws inimical to the Jesuit Society would have been repealed 
but for the opposition of such good Catholics as Giles Brent, 
Gerard, and Greene.^ Leonard Calvert, who failed to share 
his brother's suspicions of the Jesuits, and his secretary, John 

1 Assembly Proceedings, I, pp. 10-12, 94, 95. See also Fr. Copley's letters, Calvert Papers, 
I, and Fr. More's Memorial, Md. Hist. Socy. Fund Pub. No. 1. 

- Brent throughout was a Catholic, and allied with the opposition. He cast the entire 
vote of the i.sland and county of Kent in the assembly of 1642. Gerard was a Catholic, 
whose wife was a Protestant, and whose brothers-in-law are said to have conducted Prot- 
estant services in a chapel dedicated to the Anglican service. Gerard was in later times 
fined 500 pounds of tobacco for secreting the key and carrying away the books of said 
chapel. Greene's religion was of the prudential sort, but he died a Catholic, leaving a 
bequest to that church. 



118 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

Lewger, more than once stood alone against all the rest; Leon- 
ard Calvert undoubtedly favored the society in derogation of 
his brother's wishes, but was finally forced into conformity by 
a scathing letter from Baltimore's pen directing him, at all 
hazards, to humble the societ}' or else be chargeable of betray- 
ing the proprietar}^ to the "greatest dishonor and prejudice 
that ever one brother did another." He strictly enjoins Gov- 
ernor Calvert to pass no more grants of land to the Jesuits 
under any pretense whatsoever.^ 

In the assembly of 1642 twent3"-two persons are named; 
but again and again the whole vote was controlled and cast l)y 
fourteen persons.^ Of these fourteen persons in turn two 
members often controlled the entire vote. These two men were 
Brent and Cornwallis. Their combined strength summed up 
as high as one hundred and twent}^ out of a total of one hun- 
dred and ninety-one voices actually represented. The}^ united 
in this session to oppose the administration, and straightway 
the administration co»certed measures to break up this power- 
ful coalition. Three days after adjournment of the session 
Cornwallis was tendered the councillor's oath, and of course 
refused it, and within a month Brent was impeached by Lew- 
ger, attorney -general for the lord proprietor. And here began 
the strife and jealousies that lasted through the Chapel-house 
litigation and even far be3^ond the " Ingle rebellion."'' In the 
troubles of 1647— IS Brent was again considered the factious 
spirit by Lord Baltimore.^ Cornwallis's religion is a question 
of controversy. It is by no means clear that he was a Protest- 
ant, and it is reasonably certain that he was the friend, cham- 
pion, and attornej^ of the Societ}" of Jesus in the province. If 
further evidence were needed on the point of Catholic control, 
additional testimon}?^, up to the date in which it was written, 
is furnished l>y Father Copley's letter of April 3, 1038.* It 
plainly shows that the attitude of the societ}^ was one of defi- 
ance. Threats of excommunication are repeated, and he 
bitterl}^ complains of Secretary Lewger's unrestrained ma- 
nipulation of the proxy. John Lewger throughout is 

J Calvert Papers, I, p. 219, 220. 

2 In regard to this point in particular and others in general the writer gratefully ac- 
knowledges the assistance of his friend, John M. Mackall, esq., whose familiarity with 
the early Maryland records renders his conclusions most valuable and of decisive weight 
upon certain important moot questions in the period under consideration. 

3 Council Proceedings, I, 126. Also, Assembly Proceedings, I, 214, 215, 220. 
♦Calvert Papers, 1, 157, 1^9. 



LORD Baltimore's struggle with the jesuits. 119 

blamed by the Jesuits for a policy approved and carried out 
by the proprietary. He was a convert from Protestantism, 
and had been commissioned by Lord Baltimore secretary of 
the province in April, 1637.^ 

From the date of the first recorded public proceedings of 
the Mar3dand Colon}^ to the critical period of 1649-50 the land 
question was paramount. The possession of great tracts of 
land by the society and their eagerness to secure further acqui- 
sitions might have aroused a man less jealous of vested inter- 
ests than was Lord Baltimore, But beyond this a broader 
question was mooting, which, had it been settled within lines of 
the society's programme, would have shorn the proprietar}- 
of every vestige of territorial sovereignt3^ The still currents 
of political life, but slightly ruffled by Old World conflicts 
between the ecclesiastical and civil powers, grew more tempes- 
tuous in Mar3dand as the result of contentions over property 
rights. Finally the more moderate designs of the Jesuits 
were eclipsed by struggles of broader and more vital character, 
and the government of the Calverts was shaken at its base. 
The society disputed Baltimore's title to any lands within the 
province not ceded to him by the Lidians. The}^ questioned, 
again and again, the right of the English Crown to grant In- 
dian lands, and distinctly and derisively denied the validity of 
his Lordship's claims as against the Indian ' ' kings. " The very 
title bestowed upon the patentee b}' the charter was derisively 
referred to as an assumption. The fathers profess themselves 
ready to shed their blood in defense of the faith and the lib- 
ert}' of the church. It may be noticed throughout that defense 
of property rights is the real point at issue when defense of 
the church is proclaimed.^ 

Baltimore was not blhid to the forces that rendered the op- 
position cohesive. He was not slow to appreciate the gravity 

1 Copley notes that "others complained very much that by the many proxies which the 
governor, Mr. Levvger, and there instruments had gotten, they did what they would with- 
out any restraints at all." He referred to Lewger's evident distrust of the society and 
assures Baltimore that these adverse views are " mere frivolous suspitions of his owne, 
without any true ground." "Truly," he sagely adds, "the divill is very busie here to 
raise such lyke apprehensions." Father More, in his Memorial to Propaganda, 1641-42, 
charges Lewger with retaining much of the leaven of heresy, since he maintained the 
dogma so offensive to Catholic oars, that no external jurisdiction is given by God to the 
supreme pontiff, but merely an internal one. " In foro conscientiae." — From the record 
of the English Provinces of the Society of Jesus. Vol. VII, p. 303. 

2 Father More's Memorial to Propaganda, 1641-12, pp. 79, 83, Johnson's Foundation; 
the author quoting from the Jesuit Archives. Also Father Copley's letter of 1638 in Cal- 
vert Papers, I. 



120 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

of the challeng-e. He looked upon the societ}' as a possible 
bar to the ultimate success of the dearest design of his life. 
He regarded the acquisition of land by them as repugnant to 
his chartered rights. He looked upon their assumption of 
spiritual independence as a challenge to authority, more sov- 
ereign in the plenitude of its powers than that of half the 
contemporary German princedoms. His fears of the society 
gave him no rest. He found no mental equipoise in a compro- 
mise that would 3'ield any material advantage to his coreligion- 
ists. He rejects all overtures from the fathers for exceptional 
privileges, and tacitly repudiates an}^ former intimation that 
the colon}" is to be governed after the manner of a Catholic 
state. He is dumb to the society's plea for exemption from 
the jurisdiction of lay courts, and refuses throughout to lend 
a complacent ear to the archaic dogma of ""benefit of clergy." 
It was as early as 1638 that he indorses Copley's l^.tter, sug- 
gesting immunities and exemptions for Catholics, as '"'contain- 
ing demands of verj extravagant privileges." From this time 
on he met the independent and combative attitude of the soci- 
ety in a spirited and aggressive campaign, which was none the 
less active and determined because its policy was veiled and 
its methods underground. Late in the j^ear 1641 he issued 
new conditions of plantation. These conditions contained se- 
cret clauses, omitted in the public records but preserved intact 
in the Jesuit Archives. These secret provisions established 
in the Marvland province the English Statutes of Mortmain. 
In addition an oath was exacted of all Mar3"land landholders 
under terms of which the grantee solemnlv foreswore all rights 
in lands granted by the Indians and pledged himself to defend, 
to the limits of his power, the title, right, and royal jurisdic- 
tion of the proprietary.^ 

In November, 1642, the proprietary penned a letter to his 
brother, his vicegerent in the Marvland province. In this 
letter he betrays his apprehensions and also outlines his pro- 
gramme for future dealing with the society. He speaks of 
the Jesuits as a "body politic," and declares that a great deal 
of land has been received by Father White from one of the 
Indian "kings." The ship which took this letter bore also to 
Maryland Messrs. Gilmett and Territt. These men, bearing 

1 Maryland Archives, Council Proceedings, I, pp. 99, 101. Extracts from Jesuit Archives 
in Johnson's Foundation, pp. 67-69. 



LOKD Baltimore's struggle with the jesuits. 121 

confidential dispatches to Governor Calvert, are to acquaint 
him with the "injury" which the Jesuits have offered the 
proprietary. * * * 

The next assembly, in which proceedings of importance are 
recorded, was held in 1647^8. The tide of opposition now 
fiercely swollen leaves its marks upon the record of this 
assembly's proceedings. They were anomalous, irregular, 
and informed with a spirit of defiance which the language of 
authority could easily denominate "seditious." While Balti- 
more was revolving at home the question of fortifying his 
authority more strongly in Maryland, the settlers on the 
banks of the Potomac were busying themselves in proclaim- 
ing defiance to that authority. A bill for the confirmation of 
his lordship's patent was "thrown out of the house" as an 
initial act. A bill for the acknowledgment of his right and 
another for the support of the proprietorial government were 
quickl}' stifled, and a formal protest entered against Leonard 
Calvert's laws of 1646-47. It was claimed that these laws 
were void because passed by a house extra-legally, if not 
illegally, summoned by the governor. The assembly drew up 
and sent to the proprietar}^ a list of grievances which reflected 
in a small way the temper of the "grand remonstrance" 
passed five j^ears before in England by the long Parliament. 
As a final stroke, they passed a bill appropriating the per- 
sonal estates of the two Calverts in settlement of debts in- 
curred in the suppression of the unexplained rebellion of 
1645-47. How the action of this assembly was received and 
answered in Maryland is a matter of record; how Baltimore 
himself met the challenge has been heretofore only a matter 
of conjecture. Governor Thomas Greene at once challenged 
the right of the assembh' to enter protest against the "pre- 
tended laws" of Leonard Calvert.^ But that this action was 
dictated b}' an3'thing more than the perfunctory conscience 
of officialism is clear enough from the fact that Greene 
offered to sign the protest himself if the assembl}^ would 
vote him a house and income. Information of the supine- 
ness, not to say duplicity, of his governor came to Balti- 
more's ears, for Greene, in 1650, was summarily dismissed 
from the office of councilor. Stone being then governor. 

1 Greene succeeded to the governorship upon the death of Leonard Calvert. 



122 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

IMio recovery of the missing portion of this letter, written 
to his lieutenants in Mar3'land by Lord Baltimore upon 
receiving news of the assembl3^'s recalcitrancy, clears up 
manj^ obscurities that have long perplexed the student of 
early Maryhmd history/ The important facts in the missing- 
portion of the letter which bear upon this investigation 
have to do with Baltimore's charge that the factious and 
re])ellious spirit of the assembly of 1647-48 proceeded from 
the "■ Deceiptf ull Suggestions of Subtle Matchiavilians pre- 
tending religion." * * * 

Even more interesting is Baltimore's remarkable letter in 
the light it throws upon tlie body of laws sent over b}^ the 
proprietary in the preceding 3'ear. His lordship ingeniously 
asserts that these laws, sixteen in number, had been proposed 
to him for the "good and quiet settlement" of the colonizers 
of the province. The declaration was specious. The laws in 
question were drawn up by Baltimore, probabl}^ at the sug- 
gestion of Levv'ger, that they could be employed as an effect- 
ive weapon of offense and defense against the Jesuits. His 
lordship instructs the provincial assembly that all or else 
none of the laws must be passed; that no alteration, addition, 
or diminution of the laws would be tolerated, and finally he 
held over their heads the forceful threat that the monopolies, 
customs duties, and burdensome conditions of plantation 
under which the colonists chafed should be continued in 
operation until the sixteen laws were passed.^ He upbraids 
the assembly for their dela}" in assenting to the ''said laws 
sent out by us." He charged them with having secret rea- 
sons for not bringing the code to a passage, and plainly insin- 
uates that the Jesuits are acting the part of obstructionists. 
He presumes the assembly will make no further scruple ""of 
consenting to all of the said laws, and in case the said sixteen 
laws above mentioned shall be consented unto by the general 
assembly and enacted as laws there within the time limited as 
aforesaid, then and not otherwise we shall be willing for the 

1 For Baltimore's reply to action of assembly, 1647-48, see Maryland archives. Assembly 
Proceedings, I, pp. 262-272. Four-fifths of this important letter, beginning in the seventh 
line of the printed archives, p. 264, Assembly Proceedings, was mi-ssing for more than two 
centuries, or until 1883. For partial explanation see Calendar XXVI, XXVII, XXVIII 
(Assembly Proceedings, I), Liber M. C. Bozman— authority. Also Upper House Journal, 
1659-60, 1669. Same lettered properly 1649-1669 in printed archives of 1S83. 

-Maryland Archives, Council Proceedings, I, pp. 201,228. 



LORD Baltimore's struggle with the Jesuits. 123 

ease of the people there to allow the one-half yearly of the 
tobacco customs due unto us to go to the common defense of 
the province."^ Now, as certain of the sixteen laws were in- 
dispensable to the political well-being- of the colon}', and as the 
security of the same depended upon the acceptance of those 
less favored, and since the obnoxious laws under which they 
groaned could only be repealed upon condition of the accept- 
ance of a new code entire, the provincial legislature found 
itself forced into reluctant assent. Thus with the whip of 
authority in his hand, Baltimore dragooned the provincial 
legislature into the interesting legislation of 1649-50. 

The act of toleration, which gives the year 1619 extraor- 
dinary distinction in Maryland annals, was neither the act of 
Protestants nor of Catholics, as partisan controversial writers, 
on the one side or the other, have sought to prove. The act 
was one of the sixteen laws, and was hurried through the 
provincial assembly under the lash of the proprietorial 
whip. In the same year Baltimore's code was sent over, new 
conditions of plantation were issued, and a Protestant govern- 
ment deliberately established by his Catholic lordship. These 
measures were parts of a triple scheme to defeat the Jesuits 
and abase the opposition. The bod}' of the sixteen laws 
denounced penalties to the death against mutinous and sedi- 
tious speeches; more than this, the English laws of mortmain 
were again brought forward, and, as if to rid himself forever 
of his factious coreligionists, he proposed to swamp their 
influence by encouraging Protestant immigration, and by set- 
ting up a Protestant government pledged by statute to guar- 
antee religious toleration. The body of the sixteen laws, then, 
is but a part of the triple scheme, restrictive conditions in 
regard to landhokUng being another, and especially favorable 
conditions to Protestant settlers in point of a Protestant gov- 
ernment and toleration bulwarked by statute being the third. 
In the matter of encouraging Protestants, Baltimore overshot 
the mark. In five years he found himself confronted by a 
party of Protestants stronger and more determined in their 
opposition than had ever been the Jesuits. Catholics were 
disfranchised in the colony they had planted, nor did the 
movement, essentially democratic, stay until it had demanded 
the downfall of the proprietorial government. 

1 Ibid, Assembly Proceedings, I, pp. 264, 265, 270. 



124 AMERICAN HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION. 

As early as 1631 the government in the Virginia colony 
l)ecame openl}^ intolerant. Under the hand of Berkeley, the 
Church-of-England governor, distress fell upon the Puritan 
settlers on the Nanseniond River. Under fire of persecution, 
two Puritan elders fled to Maryland in' 1618. It was probably 
at their suggestion that Governor Stone issued an invitation to 
the entire Nanseniond congregation to cross over into Mary- 
land. Stone's liberal promises of local self-government and 
freedom of conscience stimulated the Puritan exodus from 
Virginia, and caused the refugees to indulge the dream of an 
independent colony in the new land of promise. They hag- 
gled at the words '"'absolute dominion," and demurred at the 
obedience due Roman Catholic officers. For a year these 
refugees remained outside the pale of Lord Baltimore's gov- 
ernment, in the full determination to erect upon the shores 
of the Chesapeake a "civitas Dei" — a church state, to which 
they gave the reverential name of "Providence." In 1651, 
in recalcitrant mood, they refused to send delegates to the 
provincial assembly, and protested against the governor's 
hostile advance upon the Indians of the Eastern Shore. Stone 
regarded these acts as rebellious, and required of them an oath 
of fidelitv, on penalt}" of forfeiture of lands. The Puritans 
protested against the oath as I'epugnant to their consciences 
as Christians, and contrary' to their rights as free subjects of 
England. They denounced the authority of the lord proprie- 
tor, for, said they, he is liable to ''make null that done in the 
assemblies for the good of the people." On notice by Stone 
that writs and warrants should no longer run in the name of 
the Commonwealth, but in that of the lord proprietor, the 
Puritans prepared for war. For a time the resort to arms 
was postponed, but one of the first acts of the ensuing legis- 
lative assembly was the disfranchisement of Catholics. This 
act, though never rigidly enforced, has left a stain upon the 
records of the colon}-. Both sides were now arming for a 
greater contest. As the first score of years was I'ounded out 
after the settlement at St. Mary's, the drama of Marston 
Moor was reenacted upon Maryland soil. Questions were 
mooting far wider than the sphere of religious controversy. 
The principles of self-government and civil equality were at 
stake. * * * The defeat of the loyalists of St. Mary's 



LORD Baltimore's struggle with the Jesuits. 125 

was the vindication of the democratic principle in Maryland. 
Within a generation after the battle of the Severn the Puritan 
settlement as a political aggregate had become a memory. 
Yet the last word of his movement had not been spoken. 
* -X- * jjj iQg^ ^i^g theater of the Puritan struggle received 
the name of Annapolis and was formally advanced to the 
political headship of the province. 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 




